I don't accept your premise that books are not factual and news media is more/entirely factual. Do you have any evidence on that?
The evidence I've got generally sways towards well-regarded non-fiction book authors generally having more expertise in the area they write about than well-regarded journalists. This also makes intuitive sense - journalists often write about many subjects and act as second-hand sources, while researchers and authors are often first-hand sources and write about fewer subjects.
My point is not that most news organizations don't publish similar articles. My point is that they do, but them doing so is not evidence that what they post is useful factual information for staying informed.
Just because you consulted multiple sources doesn't mean you get a true picture. 3 bibles all will tell you there is 1 god because those three sources share the same underlying bias.
A dozen news sources will tell you the same thing, but that could also mean that they share the same underlying biases (the bias towards a quick and profitable news cycle vs a slow and thoughtful conveyance of meaningful fact).
The fact that NYT, Reuters, etc are all reporting on a fast news cycle and using similar content doesn't mean that the content they're reporting is intended to inform me and give me a more realistic grounding necessarily. It could also mean they all have the same profit motives and all optimize to produce more clicks rather than inform more meaningfully.
To make sure I'm not being taken the wrong way, I do think the news generally does strive to be both true and to convey information. I think that the competing need to drive clicks/ad-dollars/etc results in it conveying information poorly. It frames true facts in ways that drive outrage to drive clicks. It tries to create a quick news cycles so there's always new things to publish. The faster news cycle favors reporters creating quick pieces, and disfavors serious investigative reporting. I don't think the news media succeeds on informing me well of important things, but rather succeeds on making me weary with a deluge of facts that won't matter in 2 weeks.
With regard to the first point, I meant those particular religious texts you cited. I'm a huge fan of nonfiction books in general.
When I open NYT, Politico, and WaPo I see:
> Justice Dept. Plans to File Antitrust Charges Against Google in Coming Weeks
> Justice Department expected to file antitrust suit against Google
> The Justice Department could file a lawsuit against Google this month, overriding skepticism from its own top lawyers
Based off of this, I figure the Justice Department will probably do some antitrust stuff involving Google in the near future.
It's probably not 100% a sure thing that it's going to happen, but it probably will, and it's now on my radar to keep an eye on since that might actually wind up being a big deal.
That's what I want out of the news. I'm not sure what else I would expect? If I open and read any of those articles, there will be different takes on the Justice department's plan to go after google, and I can read into those however much I want, but the core facts are that the Justice department is planning on going after Google. I don't think that's made up, and I think antitrust + big tech is a pretty important issue to keep an eye on.
Ah, yup, on the first point I misunderstood what you meant. Apologies for reading your comment in a poorer light than it was.
We agree in some broad strokes, but seem to disagree on other points.
The original comment I wrote was contesting the idea that averaging multiple points of view necessarily mean that you're getting closer to the truth. It can mean that, but it doesn't have to if there's a shared underlying bias.
I think we'd also disagree on the value of being informed about current things similar to your example of a google anti-trust suit. I would personally expect that reading the average news article on it does not make me meaningfully more informed (since journalists digest the original court filing or whatever prompted it into a piece devoid of value in my experience).
I'd say that you get more value out of understanding the broader context: how anti-trust suits in the US generally go. In all probability, in 4 months that headline will be completely irrelevant and nothing will have happened. It's more likely that it's a clickbait bit of news churn based on a fragment of truth than that it's both true, and the implication that it's meaningful and important news for us to know is also true.
The evidence I've got generally sways towards well-regarded non-fiction book authors generally having more expertise in the area they write about than well-regarded journalists. This also makes intuitive sense - journalists often write about many subjects and act as second-hand sources, while researchers and authors are often first-hand sources and write about fewer subjects.
My point is not that most news organizations don't publish similar articles. My point is that they do, but them doing so is not evidence that what they post is useful factual information for staying informed.
Just because you consulted multiple sources doesn't mean you get a true picture. 3 bibles all will tell you there is 1 god because those three sources share the same underlying bias.
A dozen news sources will tell you the same thing, but that could also mean that they share the same underlying biases (the bias towards a quick and profitable news cycle vs a slow and thoughtful conveyance of meaningful fact).
The fact that NYT, Reuters, etc are all reporting on a fast news cycle and using similar content doesn't mean that the content they're reporting is intended to inform me and give me a more realistic grounding necessarily. It could also mean they all have the same profit motives and all optimize to produce more clicks rather than inform more meaningfully.
To make sure I'm not being taken the wrong way, I do think the news generally does strive to be both true and to convey information. I think that the competing need to drive clicks/ad-dollars/etc results in it conveying information poorly. It frames true facts in ways that drive outrage to drive clicks. It tries to create a quick news cycles so there's always new things to publish. The faster news cycle favors reporters creating quick pieces, and disfavors serious investigative reporting. I don't think the news media succeeds on informing me well of important things, but rather succeeds on making me weary with a deluge of facts that won't matter in 2 weeks.